St Croix, here we come! - May 26, 2020

Well, here we are off the island of St Croix in the US Virgin Islands. It’s beautiful here and there is some great diving to be had, so after the work is done for the day, we plan to blow some bubbles.

Gurty’s first open water passage was a success! It was a good sea trial for her as it was an upwind beat, but she made it through. She started the trip up top on the flybridge but after a little bit decided that lying in the corner under the cockpit table was more her speed, so that’s where she spent most of the trip. Nothing wrong with that! She found a spot pretty much as close to the boat’s center of gravity as she could get. That’s a smart pup!

Once we were just off St Croix and conditions lightened up, she came back up to the bridge and into the anchorage like a rock star. All she needed was a little Captain’s hat! We went ashore to stretch legs and take care of business and then came back to the boat and had some friends join us for Happy Hour (Caipirinhas and Fried Won Tons) and Dinner (Thai Green Chicken Curry over Jasmine Rice (apologies for the Memorial Day menu)). Gurty was the star of the show. She is very well behaved around food, she doesn’t beg at all. (Ha ha! Wait for a further update on this topic once we get to Ft Lauderdale!)

Today we reached out to her foster mom for a little more info just so we could know her story a little bit better. It seems Gurty started out on the streets of the BVI and was really just skin and bones when she was rescued and she was brought back to health thanks to PAW, BVI and her foster mom Samantha. We also learned that Gurty loves to play with other dogs, which is great news! Right now, we don’t have any other pups to play with, but we’ll see what we can do in that regard. She is a real trooper and she’s been through lots of changes which must be incredibly confusing for her. We also learned she is a doggy hero! She had a litter of 5 pups a few months back and nursed them til they were big enough to eat doggie food. Then another new puppy mom had some serious health complications, and Gurty stepped in as the foster mom to six more puppies! She nursed that litter as well, so now it’s time for her to put her feet up and take a vacation on a crewed charter yacht! (This explains why she sleeps a lot – she’s been working hard!) She has all the boat toys to herself and spends the early part of the day sunning, the heat of the day napping (we have to make sure she doesn’t get sunburned) and the evening just being cute and adorable. Now she’s on Easy Street for her boat trip and subsequent life as a New Yorker.

This afternoon, we dove the Twin Wrecks on St Croix. One is shallower than the other, but the deep wreck is at just about 100 feet. It was absolutely gorgeous, the water was crystal clear and the marine life was fantastic. Tomorrow we will dive the Pier at Fredricksted and try to find some seahorses. Though I hear they are very difficult to locate. Wish us luck, and we will report back tomorrow!